A Scale of Sapphire

Matt

There was blood on my hands. A goblin on the ground at my feet. Hissing, shrieking cries rang out across the clearing. Some ran towards me, blades in hand, others ran away, and the one I killed did nothing at all.

I felt sick.

They were monsters, right? They’d killed people, hadn’t they? Monsters got us into this mess, monsters like my dad, so why did I feel so sick? Why was it that when I looked in this dead goblin’s eyes, I could only think of my mother, lifeless on the floor?

She was there, bleeding in front of me. The monster, my father, held her tight in its arms, and she… held it back? She whispered something before her eyes rolled back and she dropped to the ground, dead again. Bloody streaks like tears ran down the monster’s face. I picked up a knife as it opened its mouth.

“I-”

“Matt!” Chelsea was holding me. She had me by the shoulders and was gently shaking me awake. We were in some abandoned department store, lying together on one of the display mattresses. I wasn’t in the goblin camp, and I wasn’t in that bloody kitchen. I took a few shaky breaths as I got my bearings. “You’re ok, Matt! It’s ok. I’m here. We’re safe.”

I felt gross. I couldn’t shake the warm and sticky feeling of blood between my fingers. The guilt and the grief and the disgust had come back in force. My emotional state had become so volatile lately. Excitement at becoming a hunter, grief when I actually performed the act, and then monumental pride when I returned home and Cyrus had praised me. Having left the safety and security of Sunrise, it seems the pain was slowly trickling in once again.

“Thanks Chel. I’m- I’m good now.”

She released my shoulders and smiled softly at me.

“Bad dreams then?”

“How could you tell?” I chuckled softly, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. “I’m ok. Everything’s just been happening so fast lately. I think I just need time to process stuff, y’know?”

We’d managed to catch the goblin’s trail with little effort. A crowd of over a dozen of them traipsing through the underbrush left some fairly obvious signs. I felt another pang of guilt as I thought about what we were doing. I knew it was necessary. That it was right. It had to be.

It had to be, because if it wasn’t…

It had to be.

Willow

I knew they’d only be gone for a few days at most, but I missed my girlfriends all the same. There was no shortage of work to do, so it’s not like I didn’t have anything to keep me occupied, but I’d gotten used to curling up on Erica’s belly and to the gentle hissing of Aoife’s breath as she slept. Our bed would feel awfully empty tonight.

Even still, I refused to mope. After seeing Erica off, I flew straight to the garden, allowing my magic to wash over the foliage beneath me. The wind whistled through the trees as they let out a collective sigh. There was a twinge in my skull as I drew on my magic, a dull, throbbing pain that I was slowly trying to get used to as my magical reserves were drained day after day. Trying being the operative word.

The truth is, I think I’d reached my limit. There were only so many plants I could support alone, so unless I got some help or found a way to disperse my magic more efficiently, the garden wouldn’t be growing any time soon, and neither would the detection system. I wasn’t even sure I could maintain what we had, but I knew I had to try. At any moment, on any day, Cyrus and his hunters could appear, so for now, I had to grin and bear it. I had to keep shouldering this burden until the threat was dealt with.

At least there was no shortage of food. The garden provided vast quantities of fruits and veggies, some that had existed prior to the flicker, and some that were wholly unique. With the help of my magic, climate and weather were non-issues. That I could still drink fresh coffee months after the complete collapse of industry was a luxury I’d never take for granted.

I was sipping on a warm mug of the stuff, nursing my perpetual headache, watching the fading sunset when the beating of massive wings drew my attention to the window. A familiar reptile, blue and silver, landed in our front lawn, and from her back slid a fiery haired vampire. Well this was a bit concerning, wasn’t it? As excited as I should’ve been to see Aoife home, Cass and Ethan shouldn’t have returned for another day or two at least, and Cass was nowhere to be found.

My worry only grew as I realized how disheveled they looked. Ethan had clearly been crying, the tracks of dried blood on their face were a dead giveaway, and viewed in tandem with their slightly shredded attire, it wasn’t a pretty picture. I quickly set my coffee down on a table, flung open the window, and flew out.

“Are you two ok? What happened to you? Where’s Cass?”

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

So Willow was trans too.

Huh.

I was learning a lot today. Apparently being trans was a lot more complicated than I’d thought. There wasn’t some universal experience or feeling or epiphany, everyone was just fumbling along through life until they worked out what made them happy, so the only real question I needed to answer, at least if Willow and Aoife were to be believed, was what would make me happy?

Honestly though, I couldn’t say. I knew what my gut was telling me, but I’d been trying my best to ignore it for so long that the idea of just going along with what it said felt impossible. There was this nagging voice in the back of my head that kept telling me I’d regret this, that you can’t experiment, that you should know, that to even consider the possibility of being trans would be an insult to the trans people standing in front of me.

Then again, they were the ones telling me to try, weren’t they? They were the ones telling me not to be ashamed. If I could trust anyone’s opinion on the matter, it would be theirs right? When I thought back to how I’d felt when Maria called me pretty or when that centaur sheltered me from the sun. I hadn’t really been aroused by the idea of being seen as a woman, instead, I was feeling attraction, wasn’t I? I’d been feeling attraction that was unrestrained by discomfort I hadn’t even realized I’d been feeling.

It just so happened that the first time it occurred I was drunk, and the second time I was already upset. I just hadn’t been thinking rationally, had I?

Shit.

Ok. I was starting to toy with the possibility that I was maybe actually just a little bit trans. Maybe just a bit.

“Screw it. I’m not gonna get anywhere just stewing on this shit.” I smiled at the two young women before me, fangs and all. “Maybe we can try calling me Evelyn, just for a little while.”

“As long as you’re comfortable with it.” Willow's eyes were bright with determination and excitement.

“Yeah. Go at your own pace, alright?” Aoife’s eyes mirrored her girlfriend’s. She was grinning, showing her teeth along with me.

“Thank you, both of you. This means a lot.”

“Of course!” Aoife’s breath chilled my neck as she and Willow drew me into a hug. “I’m sorry you had to deal with this shit before you were ready for it, but things could’ve gone a lot worse. If you ever need anything, just let us know.”

WIth that, we bid our farewells, and I watched as the two of them wandered back towards their house, Willow pulling out a tiny flask that smelled oddly like blood as they did. I guess that was that then. I was Evelyn until I told them otherwise. For once, that thought didn’t scare me.